At this time of year I always think of Thumper. Perhaps it’s the
springtime, Easter time, or maybe a combination of both when wild life
once again emerges, or talk of the Easter Bunny takes place.
But I can go the rest of the year without thinking
of that furry white bundle, until spring and Easter bring him to mind.
He wasn’t even an Easter gift, one that animal
rights activists warn against giving, and parents surprise the kids with
anyway. You know, the little chicks and bunnies that make great presents
until the novelty wears off and the animals are neglected. But he was a
gift, none-the-less, that my father said I could have.
For one spring when I was perhaps ten and my sister
fourteen, Dad gave in to my sisters pleadings to have a horse. Now we
lived on a farm, complete with a big red barn and stalls. There was
plenty of acreage to ride a horse. So my father’s resolve was worn down,
I guess, and so Ann got her horse.
Now I was the little one, stubborn, and not about
to let Dad off the hook without a pet of my own. Sure, we had a dog
once, but Buster had long since died. And there were the myriad barn
cats, each of which had a name and a place in my heart. But if Ann was
going to get a horse, I wanted a rabbit.
After
he and Mom lectured me on the care of animals, the responsibilities of
keeping the hutch clean, of feeding and caring for the animal daily and
being warned that the rabbit would be my responsibility and after
pleadings and promises made by me, Dad got busy building a hutch.
I remember thinking two things as he built that
hutch. First, as I watched him expertly craft a structure out of wood
and chicken wire, I thought my Dad must be the most talented man in the
world. And when the hutch was finished, I thought that rabbit would be
the luckiest bunny in the world, for his hutch seemed to be the Hilton
Hotel of all hutches.
I also remember feeling a little smug thinking that
I was smarter than my sister for the first time in my life. After all, I
would be the owner of a small creature who didn’t require much care and
very little food, while she, on the other had, would be responsible for
cleaning out the entire barn with a shovel and responsible to feed an
animal that well, would eat like a horse!
Finally, the big day came. I believe that Gypsy the
horse was already munching hay away in her big red barn when Dad took me
to pick out my bunny.
Now, if you’ve seen one bunny, you’ve seen them
all, and back then there weren’t the many different colors and varieties
available as there are now on display each year at the 4-H Fair. No,
there were just white rabbits, with long ears and pink, wiggly noses.
And though I don’t really remember how I chose him, whether by closing
my eyes and quickly picking, or if it was something about his little
personality that drew me to him, regardless, I chose one and snuggled
him into my arms and promptly named him Thumper.
Once we were home and Thumper was checked into the
Hilton Hutch, I realized that the chicken wire was a little big and
allowed Thumper’s tiny feet to fall through the wire. But those first
few days he was in my arms more often than the hutch, so it really
wasn’t a problem. That is, it wasn’t a problem until I took him out to
play one day, and noticing bright red on his otherwise immaculately
white fur, and realized that a cat had taken a rather large bite out of
his foot.
But with tender love and care, his foot healed
minus the missing portion, and although Thumper never really was able to
live up to his name like Bambi’s friend Thumper, he was still a
wonderful rabbit and friend.
The average life span of domestic rabbits is
between five and ten years, so it should have been no surprise that when
I was eighteen, I came home from my senior class trip to find the Hilton
Hutch empty. Mom told me that she had given him a proper burial, and I
marked his grave with a cross.
Gypsy the horse had long since died, as she was an
older horse when she became Ann’s. And so I guess it was just a part of
growing up, to get those friends as children, and to let them go at a
time when we were ready to be grown-ups, moving on and leaving childish
things behind.
But even after all these years, when the spring
begins bringing whispers of the Easter Bunny with it, I remember
Thumper.
